Citizen Candidacy with Asymmetric Information
39 Pages Posted: 19 Jun 2003
Date Written: May 2003
Abstract
We extend a simple version of the citizen candidates model (developed by Osborne-Slivinsky (1996) and Besley-Coate (1997)) to an asymmetric information setting, in which the type of a given individual is assumed to be private information. Focusing on a particular class of perfect Bayesian equilibria, we show that there exist two kinds of equilibria. In the first one, both non-median types become candidates and those equilibria generalize to any number of (potential) candidates. In the second one, only one of the non-median types chooses to become candidates for the election and those equilibria hold for a number of (potential) candidates at most equal to three. This is in sharp contrast with the complete information framework in which only the median type individuals stand for office when the entry cost is sufficiently low.
Keywords: Political economy, information, political competition
JEL Classification: D72, D82
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation
Do you have a job opening that you would like to promote on SSRN?
Recommended Papers
-
The Political Economy of Clientelism
By James A. Robinson and Thierry Verdier
-
Democracy, Credibility and Clientelism
By Philip Keefer and Razvan Vlaicu
-
By James A. Robinson and Ragnar Torvik